Investors with foreign sources of capital, including pension funds and sovereign wealth funds, are increasingly seeking access to Australian real estate and infrastructure. Such investors are attracted by recently introduced taxation concessions for certain foreign investors (under the managed investment trust regime), a reduction in domestic competition for prime commercial, retail and industrial real estate assets and a relatively stable political and investment system.
Our market leading experience in structuring and executing inbound investment into Australian real estate has made King & Wood Mallesons legal adviser of choice for providing solutions to leading Asian and global real estate and infrastructure investors and managers.
Our unrivalled commercial real estate, funds, real estate capital markets, regulatory and Managed Investment Trust (MIT) / tax capability, enables us to provide a co-ordinated ‘single desk’ service and market leading know-how and documentation.
Our experience covers listed and unlisted real estate across all key sectors; from office to residential, industrial and hospitality / leisure sectors, and real estate-related infrastructure.
In recent months we have advised on a number of high profile, complex cross-border investments into Australian real estate on behalf of leading Singapore, Hong Kong, US and Canadian real estate investors and managers. These include advising:
a Singapore based fund manager on the acquisition by a number of its offshore clients of interests in the Charter Hall Core Plus Industrial Fund, the GPT Wholesale Office Fund and the Lend Lease Real Estate Partners NZ Trust;
RREEF on its acquisition of the iconic ASX Building at 20 Bridge Street, Sydney for an Asian institutional client;
Singapore-based Ascendas on its entry into the Australian market through its acquisition, with Accor, the leading global hospitality group, of a stake in the Mirvac Wholesale Hotel Fund, and the management rights to the Mirvac Wholesale Hotel Fund;
LaSalle Investment Management on several acquisitions on its co-investment in development projects sponsored by Leightons, Australand and Toga, and its acquisition of Trinity Funds Management;
Public Sector Pension Investment Board on its participation in a consortium to acquire Charter Hall Office REIT;
Goldman Sachs on its participation in a consortium to acquire Redcape Property Fund; and
AEP Investment Management and Keppel T&T (managers of Securus Data Property Fund) on the acquisition of the Gore Hill Data Centre, Sydney, one of Australia’s first Shariah compliant fund investments.
For more information on the structuring and execution of inbound investment in Australian real estate, please see King & Wood Mallesons' Real Estate, Real opportunities - Investing in Australian real estate